Obviously unless you just popped up from a hole like Punxsutawney Phil, you are aware that in the college football system there is a way around signing more recruits than unscrupulous schools have scholarships. It is called Gray-Shirting. It is something Notre Dame and other reputable colleges and universities do not practice. The SEC does and has for a long time. They are very good at it. This year, the SEC decided to clean house a bit and limit over-signing and put a cap at 25 signees per year. It sounds good on paper.
Basically you recruit the guys you want and tell them they are headed for your program, you want them. Welcome aboard. Blah. Blah. They quit looking and taking visits to other schools and are pretty much in your pocket and not in your opponents.
Alabama, you know them. They just won the National Championship AND just signed the number one recruiting class for 2012. Dang. How do they do that? Easy, Gray-Shirting.
After you have lied to the recruit, you tell him you ran out of scholarships and you still really want the kid but they have to Gray-Shirt. It is told that maybe by January a scholarship will come available and can be awarded to him. In the meantime he has a number of options.
a. Get a job
b. Enroll in a junior college
c. Enroll at the Gray-Shirt school at his expense
d. Try and get a scholarship on or after signing day
e. Disappear
f. Hope for a phone call in January
How do schools like Alabama then “find” scholarships in January to offer guys like Darius Philon? At Alabama there is no such thing as a four year scholarship, a guarantee of playing football and getting an education. No honoring any commitment to the student athlete. Actually the same can be technically said for Notre Dame. Scholarships are renewed annually. The difference is that Notre Dame does not dump underperforming players or those injuried. Alabama does and uses any guise and excuse.
Anyway, you have got to read the story about Darius Philon from Prichard Alabama and then watch the two-minute video where he is humiliated and embarrassed to death. He ends up finding a scholarship at Arkansas on Wednesday, National Signing Day. He has never visited Arkansas and it is assumed he has no idea on a course of study.
HERE is the story. Darius has basically become a piece of meat.
His coach Kerry Stevenson should be outraged; instead he acts as an apologist for Alabama. What a moron. He probably gets free tickets to Bama games from the recruiting coaches and does not want to lose that perk.
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